


Crickling

by middlemarch



Category: Poldark (TV 2015)
Genre: Conversations, Doctors & Physicians, F/M, Gossip, Marriage, Trauma, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 10:07:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12815223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/middlemarch/pseuds/middlemarch
Summary: Crickling is a Cornish word meaning collecting items for marriage.





	Crickling

“I think Ross must mind himself,” Caroline mused. The bed was in disarray, from Dwight’s nightmare not vigorous love-making, and she was idly running her fingers through a tangled coil of her hair, her voice a little tired. Dwight lay on his back, looking up at the silken canopy, wondering how long it would take to forget. This was marriage then, their marriage of intimacy and distance, and he was not sure if either of them regretted it.

“Why? What do you mean?” he asked. He would rather have stayed quiet but there was so much he withheld from her, he must give her attention where he could.

“That dinner-party, anyone with eyes to see would have noticed how Lieutenant Armitage regarded Demelza. She did look very fine, the color suited her,” Caroline went on. It was an answer but it needn’t have been, she could have kept talking without any interruption from him it seemed.

“How did he?” Dwight said, curious now about Caroline’s observations. How her mind worked, and what she had seen that he had not.

“Truly? You didn’t see?” she replied, shifting to face him. The light was dim, he saw the tip of her nose and her plump lower lip, unrouged. Shadow obscured any gleam in her eyes.

“As if she hung the moon and stars. Aphrodite rising from the sea. His lady-fair, whose colors he’d carry into battle—shall I go on?” Caroline said. She was not envious, he heard that; she was somehow glad for her friend, though what she described sounded like nothing but the prospect of suffering for all parties to Dwight’s ear. He made a sound that was equivocal, thought of how distracted Ross could be and how many times the man had left his wife. 

“You don’t like me talking this way?” Caroline asked. Would she chaff him, banter—or was she seeking reassurance, approval, acceptance? He felt he should know but he didn’t.

“I wouldn’t say that,” he replied. It was the truth and it bridged a silence that was dangerous. Fearful.

“I suppose I’m a terrible gossip and goodness knows, you’re nothing of the kind,” she said. There was challenge in her voice with apology, a rare combination that he recognized was her hallmark.

“A physician cannot be,” he remarked. He was still that even if he was a husband to a wife he barely knew, a man who hardly knew himself.

“And a physician’s wife? May she?” Caroline said, leaning closer. Her eyes were nearly grey, the blue smoky. Did she want him to regard her as Hugh did Demelza, as a goddess, or as Ross sometimes did his wife, as his sweetheart and companion, worthy, above all, of his trust even if the reverse could not be said? He suspected she did not want him to ask her those questions.

“She may be however she pleases—as long as she is herself,” he said slowly.

“Oh, Dwight, what a pretty speech! And nearly true,” she added.

“Caroline?”

“A woman can never be herself in company. What would become of society! But alone, with those closest to her, then perhaps…” she explained so that he understood her. For the first time since his return, it seemed, he grasped something essential about her, that was a consolation. That convinced him their marriage would not founder, however unsteady it was now.

“A physician does not mind hearing gossip, you know,” he said, finding it was not so hard to interject a note of levity.

“I’d hoped as much. Else I’d bore you to tears within a twelvemonth, my darling,” she replied. Another revelation and so cunningly shared. He reached for her and drew her down to his chest, let himself feel the weight of her against him.

“You never bore me, Caroline. Perplex me, perhaps, but never bore me,” he said.

“Good. Now, will you rest again, or should I tell you more?” she asked, her words soft breath against his bare skin where the nightshirt gaped. He felt drowsy, the canopy above picked out with spangles like stars, Caroline cleaving unto him like their marriage vow.

“Both,” he said, letting himself be greedy as she so often told him to be. Letting himself fall asleep to his wife’s voice and nothing else.

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little Carolight vignette intended to explore some of the themes about identity and trauma that have been floating around...


End file.
